


Denounce

by Anonymous



Series: Stickler for 6 [1]
Category: Lab Rats (TV 2012)
Genre: Angst, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Death, Emotional Hurt, Everything Hurts, Funeral, Gen, Grief, Hurt, Hurt No Comfort, Mourning, Oneshot, Open Ending, TBA - Freeform, The Author Regrets Everything
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-09
Updated: 2020-12-09
Packaged: 2021-03-10 03:54:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,223
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27964127
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: He’s only been their brother for three and a half years, but he knows.“You’ve got to accept it.” Is what they say to him, but theres nothing to accept, because they aren’t gone.
Relationships: None
Series: Stickler for 6 [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2048063
Kudos: 10
Collections: Anonymous





	Denounce

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Cauterize](https://archiveofourown.org/external_works/723563) by Lady Altair. 



> Post 3x12 AU, Contains Spoilers.

I.

It had only been a month. Only a month, before the government announced them dead.

It breaks his mother, crying into her sons shoulder, petting him. She’s mumbling words of i love you and im sorry. He nods, hand being crushed weakly by her own. His mother needed comfort, needed it for the longest time because her husband was gone and her three other children were captured, and now, dead. 

Leo considered he needed comfort, like his mother, but he felt himself fine without it. The weeks before the announcement were active ones, where Leo protested his siblings being held captive, where he’d blog on every website he could, serving a call for justice, or more unanswered calls to the president. 

It was all so, _hope inducing_.

Leo pries his eyes away from the screen that’s just shattered his psyche, looking around everywhere but his mothers side.

The only thing he can think, at the moment, is not that they were dead and gone and they were never, ever, coming back, but, that Big D was coming home. 

II.

The reunion is a less heartfelt than Leo expected, because, well, half of the family is gone.

Leo still doesn’t take it. “You’ve got to accept it.” Is what they say to him, but theres nothing to accept, because they aren’t gone.

Seeing his family so torn is the only thing keeping him up and along, because if he stops he’ll finally take it all in, and that wouldn’t be anything worth keeping at all.

Big D had been released from jail. He is pale, and skinny. He looks extremely small. He was always a short man, but the effects of just a month in jail reminds Leo. 

His mother hugs her husband for the first time in their home, and she about covers him completely. 

He says I love you, wrapped tightly against her, and Leo leaves the room because his mother is crying again, and he’d heard too much of it in the last few weeks.

The only place Leo can think of to hide away is the lab. Like before. 

It doesn’t reek of memories or sorrow, just weird food combinations Adam probably left in his capsule or in the cupboards, near Chase’s newly built nerd gadgets that are far, far away from Bree’s own side of the lab because she’d gotten angry the last time they left their stuff lying around.

 _Nevermind_ , molecules of pesky rememberances covered Leo like fine dust, which in truth there was a lot of, and he retreated to his room.

Their walls weren’t sound proof, and he could still hear his mother sobbing in his stepfathers arms, but it gave a little more familiar comfort than the scene in their basement.

III.

The funeral, isn’t much short of worse.

His mother is sharp, refraining from any tears spilling out before the service, although Leo knows shes tense, when she tightens his tie too fast and too hard, or when she squeezes his and Big D’s hands too tightly, as if they were going to disappear into the wind, leaving her alone.

Mr. Davenport is tight lipped and tired. He’d been slowly gaining the weight back, but every so often his appetite would disappear, his appearance would plummet, and Leo would catch him keeping his gaze a little longer on their capsules.

At the funeral, there are many people.

Leo isn’t crying. His mother is, Douglas is, Big D is, and there are people he’s never seen before crying and caressing his siblings graves. 

Those holes in the ground are filled. Weren’t dug up, in the first place, because they never got the bodies back. 

It perplexed Leo, that they never got the bodies back. They told him that their bodies had been burnt to a crisp. 

Leo would rather have to bury what was left of them than be handed an empty platter of meaningless words from robotic generals.

“You’ve got to accept it.” Is what they say to him, but theres nothing to accept, because they aren’t gone.

IV.

He’s been having dreams. Big D tells him it’s normal after a.. loss. The word sticks in Leo’s mouth unpleasantly. He doesn’t want to repeat it, nor has he said any words pertaining to what happened.

He hasn’t said their names, in over a month.

It marks two months since their death, and Leo still can’t take it upon himself to accept it. He keeps himself busy, inventing things that end up in the junk pile, sleeping, watching meaningless tv and going to school.

Going to school wasn’t the same, not even the same from before his mother married Mr. Davenport. When it was just him and his mother, it was a little lonely, sure, but it was them, and only them. Tasha and Leo Dooley against the world. Against the bullies.

When his mother married Big D, Leo would be lying if he said he preferred the life he left behind in his rinky dink apartment. 

Not to mention, he’d gained a total of three(3) totally epic, cool, _bionic_ siblings. Slipping into life as Leo Dooley, little brother of bionic superheroes Adam, Bree, and Chase, who had a mother and an eccentric stepfather was a little hard, but the journey forwards proved it all worth it.

Slipping into Leo Dooley, little brother of none, with a mother and a mourning stepfather was like slipping down an ice path. It came all too fast, and left him with cold burn.

The journey proved nothing, because the world was too big once more, with no one and nothing to fill it. It was Leo Dooley, against the world, and himself.

He had been told, once again, “You’ve got to accept it.” but there was nothing to accept, because they weren’t gone.

V.

His dreams.

His dreams were getting more frequent, more reoccurring, and far too _loud_. They snuck up on him, like nothing he’d ever seen before.

They made him jump out of his skin in class, and he hadn’t even been sleeping. His heartrate explodes in random increments, when all he’d been doing was making himself lunch.

He finds himself coming back into his consciousness with broken things lying around him. Broken glass, ripped pictures and bruises. Bruises littering his body in long stripes and faded circles.

Maybe he’d finally gone mad. He expected it, anyways. 

Leo’s dreams felt far too real, and soon the world that told him “You’ve got to accept it.” became a size too small, and Leo felt like a monster reigning his terror against everyone around him.

V.

“You’ve got to accept it.” Is what they told him for six months. But there was nothing to accept, because they weren’t gone.

There was nothing to accept, because they weren’t gone. Six months. Six months they said “You’ve got to accept it.”

Soon enough, he did, because he was in his senior year of highschool, and all that plagued his mind was exams, college entrances and when his next five minute locker break would be.

“You’ve got to accept it.” Is what they said to him, and there was everything to accept, because Leo was in denial.

Leo was in denial, and they knew it.

“You’ve got to accept it.” Is what they said to him, for six months. 


End file.
